 Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi | Getty Images Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, in an email to employees on Sunday, said the company would cut back on spending and treat hiring as a privilege. Khosrowshahi said he met with investors in New York and Boston following the company’s earnings call last week, adding that the market is experiencing a seismic shift, and Uber needs to react accordingly. More: - Khosrowshahi said the company would cut spending on less efficient marketing and incentives and ensure its unit economics work.
- The company plans to be more deliberate about cutting costs across the board.
- Hiring will be treated as a privilege, and the company will be intentional about when and where it adds headcount.
- Uber shares were down over 10% by afternoon trading on Monday.
Zoom out: - On Monday, U.S. stocks continued their downward spiral, with the S&P 500 trading below 4,000 for the first time in over a year.
- The S&P was down 3.2% to 3,991.24
- The Dow was down 1.99%, to 32,245.70, losing over 650 points.
- The Nasdaq dropped 4.29% to 11,623.25.
- Tech stocks have been impacted the most by the recent market selloff.
- Several tech companies have announced layoffs or hiring freezes.
- Last week, the Nasdaq fell for a fifth consecutive week, closing down 1.40% on Friday.
- On Wednesday, the Fed raised interest rates by 0.5% in a bid to curb rising inflation, bringing its target interest rate between 0.75% and 1%.
NOTE: Inside.com's founder and CEO, Jason Calacanis, is an investor in Uber.
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Shares of U.S. EV startup Rivian Automotive fell over 20% on Monday. The stock dropped following news that Ford, which owns a 12% stake in the company, or about 102 million shares, was selling 8 million shares through Goldman Sachs. The insider lockup for Rivian expired on Sunday. JP Morgan also plans to sell between 13 million and 15 million shares of Rivian for an unknown seller. More: - Rivian had its IPO in November, setting its price at $78 a share.
- Shares of the company popped more than 50% when it opened, trading at over $100 a share.
- The startup closed its first trading day with a market cap of $86B, more than that of Ford at ~$78B then.
- Its share price rose as high as $179.49 by mid-November.
- Rivian shares are down over 75% year to date. It closed at $22.78 a share on Monday.
- Amazon owns an 18% stake in the company; last month, the e-commerce giant reported a $7.6B loss on its investment in Rivian.
- Rivian expects to produce about 25,000 electric trucks and SUVs this year, about half of the amount it forecasted last year, citing supply chain constraints.
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Shares of data-mining company Palantir Technologies fell over 20% on Monday following its Q1 2022 earnings release. The company missed analysts’ expectations for Q1 revenue and earnings and provided a less than expected revenue guidance for the current quarter. Palantir Q1 revenue was $446M, up 31% YoY. More: - Commercial revenue grew 54% YoY; U.S. Commercial revenue grew 136% YoY.
- Government revenue grew 16% YoY, and Customer count grew 86% YoY.
- The company reported a net loss of $101M and diluted adjusted EPS of 2 cents.
- Palantir expects $470M for Q2 revenue and reiterated its annual revenue growth of 30% or more through 2025.
- Palantir’s stock was down more than 20% on Monday, closing at $7.46 a share.
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 Defense contractors say they are encountering supply chain issues, labor constraints, and inflationary pressures as they increase production following the war in Ukraine. The stock prices for U.S. defense contractors like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon Technologies, and General Dynamics have increased by 12% to 15% since the start of the war as the U.S. and European governments increased spending on defense and weapons systems. More: - During their earnings call in April, these companies acknowledged that they would profit from increased demand for their weapons systems and defense spending due to the war.
- Some companies are considering redesigning some of their weapons as finding sources for non-Russian titanium and other components has proved difficult.
- Demand for Stingers and Javelins, shoulder-fired missiles, has increased since the start of the war in Ukraine.
- The U.S. has sent Ukraine about a fourth of its Stinger stockpile and has committed over 5,500 Javelins.
- The U.S. is the world’s biggest military spender; in 2021, the U.S. accounted for 38% of the world’s defense spending.
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 A message from EQUITYBEE It’s not every day that a prominent startup-like Instacart lowers their valuation by a staggering 40%. Yet, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the food delivery app’s workers should be worried. What could be in it for employees: - Employees stand to gain more in case the valuation goes back up
- It might be more attainable for employees to exercise their shares
- Having the company transparently share this with employees garners trust and means employees can make more informed decisions regarding their employee stock options
But in order to gain from any company or valuation growth in the future, startup employees still need to exercise their options… and that may seem daunting when you don’t have thousands of dollars just lying around. That’s what Equitybee is for. We help startup employees to exercise their stock options and participate in the success of the companies they helped build, by funding the full costs of the exercise (including taxes!). Sign-up to get started
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BioNTech, the company that co-developed the first COVID-19 vaccine with Pfizer, released its earnings on Monday, more than tripling its Q1 revenue. The German biotech company reported €6.4B ($6.76B) in revenue, up % YoY. Net income came in at €3.7B ($3.91B), or €14.24 ($15.04) a share, up % YoY. More: - The company expects full-year 2022 COVID-19 vaccine revenues to fall between €13B ($13.73B) and €17B ($17.95B).
- As of April, BioNTech and Pfizer have signed orders for 2.4 billion COVID vaccine doses for 2022.
- They are on track to deliver about 2 billion doses to low- and middle-income countries by the end of 2022.
- BioNTech plans to spend between €1.4B ($1.48B) and €1.5B ($1.58B) on research and development expenses in 2022.
- BioNTech ADRs were up over 2% on Monday.
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Elon Musk plans to quintuple Twitter’s annual revenue to $26.4B by 2028, according to a pitch deck sent to investors. Details of Tesla's CEO's plans for Twitter were shared on Friday by the New York Times. Musk also plans to cut Twitter’s reliance on advertising to 45% of total revenue. Ad revenue currently accounts for about 90% of Twitter’s total revenue. More: - Musk also plans to increase revenue per user to $30.22 by 2028, a $5.39 increase from Twitter’s current amount.
- Musk believes he can grow Twitter’s total users to about 600 million by 2025 and 931 million by 2028. Twitter had about 217 million users by the end of last year.
- He expects to grow Twitter Blue subscribers to 69 million by 2025 and 159 million by 2028.
- Twitter Blue users pay $2.99 a month to customize their experience on the app.
- Musk noted plans for Twitter to bring in $15M from a payments business by 2023 and would increase that amount to about $1.3B by 2028.
- Musk also included plans to have 104 million subscribers by 2028 for a new product called X.
- Last month Twitter’s board accepted Musk’s $44B offer to take over the social media company.
- Last week, it was published that Musk has secured about $7B in new funding from investors like Sequoia Capital, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, and crypto platform Binance.
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 Rich Strike and team after Kentucky Derby win | Getty Images Quick Hits - From 5x to 10x, VC growth stage revenue multiples have doubled in the past year, according to the 2022 Pepperdine Private Capital Markets Report.*
- Rich Strike, a 3-year-old colt, won the 148th Kentucky Derby on Saturday, beating 80-1 odds. The horse drew into the race on Friday after another horse was scratched.
- Stocks around the world suffered their worst day since June 2020. The FTSE All-World barometer of global equities dropped ~3% on Monday. Europe’s Stoxx 600 index fell 2.9%, China’s CSI 300 fell 0.8%, and the U.S. S&P 500 fell 3.2%, falling below 4,000 for the first time in over a year.
- Marvel movie Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness brought in $450M at the global box office on its opening weekend. It brought in $185M in North America, making it the 11th best domestic opening for a major motion picture of all time.
- Several internet providers, including AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon, have agreed to improve the subsidized high-speed internet plans they offer to millions of unconnected households as part of a Biden administration push to increase participation in the program created under the infrastructure law.
- During his speech at the nation’s annual Victory Day parade celebrating the country's triumph in World War II, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was a pre-emptive strike against an aggression. He claimed Russia was fighting on its own land.
- Same old marketing automation not cutting it these days? Get our eBook and power up your customer experiences.*
*This is a sponsored post.
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 |  | Vanessa Omeokachie is a Researcher at Inside. Her interests include finance, tech, and startups. In her free time, she enjoys reading, hiking, attending music festivals, and traveling. Connect with her on Twitter @VanessaOmeo or through email at vanessa@inside.com |  | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 Ford. | |
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